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Wow, read Auto News story of how this effects the Auto Industry. Even better, read all the "comments". As usual NADA stands alone on the sidelines.

I just read the story and concluded that all the experts are just as confused as I am.

Based on what I've read here and on the Internet I worry about the impact of higher taxes on the wealthy and what that will do to business investment in the future. Will we return to the days where the top Income Tax Rate approached 50%?

“The nonpartisan CBO, in an annual analysis of the White House budget proposal, said today that under Obama’s plan deficits would never shrink below 4 percent of the economy between now and 2020. The cumulative deficits would total $9.76 trillion, and debt held by the public would amount to 90 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product by 2020, the CBO said.”

As far as the sales biz goes, it seems like another hit to peoples disposable income. If, taxs and Ins premiums are going up 15%, there will be only one place to take up slack, and that is big ticket, or "toy" purchases.

Car biz will be hurt, but think of boats, RVs, lake houses, etc. This will cut back the peoples willingness to spend. People I talk to are just plain scared.

In many areas of Texas, "real world" health insurance premiums went up MUCH more than the 15% maximum supposedly allowed. My brother who is retired from the engineering department of a statewide power company, whose division HQ is located in our town, just had his family premium go from $1456 per month in 2016, to $2572 for 2017. Previously they had 4 plans from the companies insurance carrier to choose from, but in 2017 they have only one option and one premium available. That is a real world increase of over 80% and he has no other option because if you have an available employer sponsored plan you aren't eligible to purchase coverage on the exchange. The plan I've been on for last 17 years, from a large regional hospital group, which allowed coverage from all our local doctors and our local hospital as well as their facilities, pulled out of the exchange this year and there is only one carrier offering coverage in this County. When we contacted our longtime carrier to see what comparable coverage to my previous Gold Plan we could purchase directly from them for my wife and I, it would have gone from $1389 to $2270...that's about 70% increase. I told the representative that was a huge increase, and she said "but you don't need to worry about it---your employer will be paying for most of it". I explained that I was self employed and would have to pay for all of it. She said the cheapest plane they could offer us as a self employed business would be $1568 a month for a plan with a $11,000 deductible, that allowed only one covered primary care physician visit per year and everything else, including prescriptions, is out of pocket until the $11,000 deductible has been met. That's not healthcare, but just extremely high priced catastrophic coverage. That same large regional hospital group, Scott & White, just merged 18 months ago with Baylor Medical, and they have gone on a building spree putting up multi billion dollar facilities all over the state as fast as they can acquire high end real estate to put them on. They are not doing that because they are losing money in the insurance business. Their affiliated doctors at their numerous clinics and hospitals are not allowed to accept Blue Cross Blue Shield of Texas insurance, which was our only option. I believe if the government is going to mandate coverage, then the exchange markets should be opened across state lines and allow all carriers to offer coverage in all markets so you have a true free market with competition. Otherwise you can wind up with a "monopoly" situation in some areas. 72 counties in Texas now have only one carrier offering insurance on the exchange--BCBS, and they no longer offer a PPO plan in Texas that allows you to access most doctors of your choice--they only offer HMO coverage now with a much smaller number of physician to choose from.